


Sing to me sweetly

by TheSweetestThing



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-01
Updated: 2015-09-01
Packaged: 2018-04-14 08:39:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,067
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4558020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSweetestThing/pseuds/TheSweetestThing
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Little Bird's wings are tied, and lawyer Oberyn Martell will do everything in his power to free her. 1930s AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sing to me sweetly

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Silberias](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silberias/gifts).



> A prompt from Silberias on tumblr - 1930S AU where Sansa (a singer) is trying to get out of an exploitive contract and gets put in touch with Oberyn, he helps get get free and she ends up asking him out.  
> I know nothing about law and almost nothing about the 1930s beyond the obvious, so I hope this reads okay!  
> And the archive warning is just Petyr being typical Petyr, don't worry there's not actually a rape scene but thought I'd tag it just in case :)  
> Enjoy!

She looks atrocious.

Her hair is mussed, cheeks blotchy pink and lips swollen and she scrubs at them frantically with the back of one hand, wheeling and staggering around her dressing room, tripping over feather boas spilling from boxes. She can still taste the clinically cool lips against hers, the slimy tongue that slid into her mouth and she shudders, vomit in the back of her throat. Hadn’t they warned her of casting couches? Sansa, so wonderfully innocently naïve had giggled and shook her head demurely, because she would never do that, and surely no man would force himself upon her. She should have seen the signs, the minute Petyr began eyeing her up while she sang and demanded she have a fancy stage-name to make herself more glamourous. 

“An advancement,” Her manager told her, fingers dangling on her thigh and squeezing from where they sat wedged together in a back booth at the club Petyr ran. The lights were off, just the two of them alone in the darkness, and Sansa should have never strayed to his side when he called out her name in passing on the way out. “I know someone who knows someone… I can make you go places.”

“I just want to sing.” She had said humbly, eyes darting down to her lap where her fingers entwined, a flush rising on her cheeks. And Petyr’s hand had clamped over her own, watery eyes gazing into hers with such intensity she shivered, and Sansa had always brushed off his lingering touches before. Not then, when one of his hands circled the trembling flesh of her sticky thigh, the other reaching up to tuck a red curl behind her ear.

“Sing you will.” He promised. “My Little Bird. Miss Alayne Stone.”

Sansa had smiled nervously, all glinting pearl teeth flashing in the shadows, and she was about to make her polite excuses and extract herself from his snare when he leant forward and pushed his lips against hers. Cloying, suffocating, and she reeled back as soon as his fisted hand in the back of her hair had relaxed.

“Shhsh.” He crooned, like she was a jumpy animal; a rabbit in the headlights, or staring down the barrel of a gun. “You needn’t be shy now.” He lazed back in their booth, hand drifting to his trousers and Sansa gulped, lips burning. "You’ve been teasing me for months…” He leant forward to stroke her cheek and she stiffened.

“No, I-” Her mouth fluttered, shame and disgust and regret coiling deep in her stomach. Tears pooled in her eyes, cheeks hot. Maybe she had led him on after all, returning his smiles and laughter and jokes.

“Relax.” Petyr told her. “You needn’t be scared. Everyone here does it. Your friend Jeyne? She’s been with a dozen men and more.”

“I’m… I’m sorry Mr Baelish.” Sansa rasped, voice hoarse with embarrassment and she cleared her throat shifting across the sticky leather seats away from him. “I think you’re a great manager but I just don’t like you that way.”

Mr Baelish nodded, cold eyes staring at her so intensely she wants to look away but she dare not. “It’ll be a great shame.” He sighed devastatingly, shaking his head.

“What?” Sansa breathed, legs clamped tight together.

“To lose my Little Bird.” He looked at her sympathetically.

“I don’t need to leave.” Sansa said desperately, because she loved the lights and the glamour and the cheering crowd that clapped and applauded for her. “I only want to sing Mr Baelish,” Her voice quivered. “Just sing.”

“Everyone wants you around here.” His smile is tight. “It would be rude to refuse them. If you just sing, you’re a problem Sansa. And if you just sing, you’re not going to get the same wage as everyone else here, you understand?”

Sansa’s mouth wobbled. “I just sang before-” Her voice shook. “You said I’m the best singer here.”

“Oh you are, sweetling you are. But a man has his needs, you understand? And girls who are awkward and don’t follow the big man are a problem, and problem employees are cheap and worthless.”

“But I need the money Mr Baelish.” Sansa pleaded. “I’m a good girl, I am. I’ll sing whatever you want just please-”

“Singing isn’t the problem Sansa. Your virtue is your selling point, but it grows stale.”

Sansa licked her lips nervously. “Please don’t fire me Petyr.”

“Do what I say, and I won’t. You think bad of me Sansa I know, but you needn’t fear me. I’m not like those other men who would have taken you straight to the couch before you even got an audition. I’m a patient man.” He smiled encouragingly. “But for now, kisses are enough payment hmm?”

And what can Sansa do but nod in submission and let him kiss her again?

She wheels around and grabs her powders and lipsticks, stuffing them in her bag before slinging it over her shoulder. She inhales shakily, taking a moment to just breathe. Her reflection in the mirror is harried and thin, eyes shiny with tears, and she takes a deep breath and fluffs up her curls. The hairpiece atop her scalp wobbles precariously, jewels catching the light and twinkling a million colours. She procures a dainty handkerchief and dabs at her eyes, wiping them softly to disguise the puffiness, lining them with slick black liner. She smoothes her dress, a brand new beaded slip of a thing that flirts with her knees, and showcases her legs, and how could she be so _stupid_ to not realise? Every other pretty girl at this club is a showgirl to accompany Sansa's performance, or at least had aspirations to be, and the other raspy low-note singers that weren't were sultry and coy with their feathers fans and boas. Sansa had thought herself the innocent one, with her white pearl earrings and silver evening gowns that she sees so clearly now emphasis her curves and create cleavage where there is not and she wants to rage, to cry, to rip those dresses to shreds. 

She does none of those things, and merely coats her lips with bright red crimson before exiting the dressing room.

What was it Shakespeare had said?

All the world’s a stage.

* * *

She feels so _dirty._

All the time, his kisses like mould, and Sansa picks at her chipped nails backstage peeking through the curtains watching a pretty brunette sing.

She chirps how she is so excited, batting her bright eyes, prancing around giddily with her dress swishing around her knees and Sansa’s stomach lurches because she was once that girl. Petyr laughs richly, congratulating her - Margaery, on her audition, trailing his hand over her arm. Margaery looks up underneath her eyelashes and pouted lips to whisper something Sansa can't hear before she's dismissed. The waft of rose perfume stings Sansa's nose as Margaery sashays past, in velvet evening dress with the long gloves, and she looks like a child playing dress up in her mother's wardrobe, wobbling in too high heels.

Sansa slinks after her, cornering her near the exit with a tight hand on her elbow.

“Ow!” Margaery yelps, golden brown eyes widening. “Let go of me!”

“Sorry.” Sansa immediately lets go, licking her lips. “I only- you shouldn’t be here.” Her eyes travel warily around them, for you could never be too careful. “Mr Baelish... you can find someone better. Go on to do better things... don’t get stuck here like me.”

“Bull.” Margaery declares, with a twist of her lips. “You’re just a jealous has-been.”

Sansa frowns. “I’m not a has-been.”

“Everyone knows it.” Margaery shrugs. “Petyr just told me. He said I’m ten times better than you ever were.” Her teeth gleam when she smiles. Lies, they were only lies to harm her and wound her and drive her into his arms. At the last show she’d performed the crowd had whooped and hollered her name, clapping so loud Sansa’s ears rang long after she’d left the stage.

“You don’t have to listen to me, but please be careful.”

“Yeah sure.” Margaery says, voice thick with derisiveness, and she steps away from Sansa to push the door open, chocolate curls spilling down her back.

"Sansa?" 

She turns around at his voice, fingers itching and she plays with them anxiously, tugging at her thumb as Petyr scans her from head to toe. 

"You were talking to the new recruit?" 

Sansa nods mutely.

"You needn't be jealous." Petyr chuckles, sliding an arm around her shoulder and bringing her close. His breath smells like whiskey, his stubble uneven and scratching her chin as he kisses her. Sloppy, disgusting, and Sansa stands stoic as his hands splay along her bare back heaving and shuddering beneath him. When he pulls away he smiles, tiny eyes alight.

"You're in a mood with me." He sighs, fingers searing her cheeks and she stiffens at the touch, not daring to pull away but hating the feel.

He peppers kisses on her nose, her cheeks, her lips, mapping down the taunt surface of her neck and she heaves in a trembling breath before stepping away from him. Dizzy, she is so dizzy, his cologne piercing her nostrils enough to make her vomit, and she hates his grubby hands and plastic lips, and she shoves him backwards and storms off. Tugging her loose silk cardigan around her shoulders willing to make the goosebumps disappear and she shivers, ignoring his calls as she falls out into the fresh night air and she tugs in huge gasps of oxygen, scraping past her trembling lips.

She staggers off, and vows never to return. Enough is enough. 

* * *

She slinks further down into the seat at the back of the club, watching the way the singers on stage sing with such gentle grace. Fragile and elegant, and Sansa wishes it were her up there in the silk pearl dress, the tiny white buckled heels and the bracelets dripping down skinny arms to hang off fleshy wrists. Their rings flash when they catch the light, lips parting softly to croon into the microphone, and Sansa has never seen anything so wonderful, so pure. 

She is enchanted, leaning forward like the children nearby, eyes wide drinking every second in of their smiling faces, and soaring high notes, and how had she got it all wrong? Everyone has an image in Hollywood. You were the good girl or the bad girl. Sansa had had plans to audition for all the movies, and when Petyr sidled up to her in the street one day and said he'd make her a star, how could she refuse? She didn't know he would carve out a career for her as 'Alayne Stone', his 'Little Bird', performing in all his clubs and never the rest. A few weeeks into her job she'd had an offer from the  _Trocadero,_ and her spirits were as high as the clouds before Petyr forbade her. 

"You're mine." He had said simply as she'd pleaded. "I don't employ you to work at other places."

The contract had been worded in a way to manipulate, and Sansa hadn't realised at the time that Petyr wanted her all the time for at least five years. She's barely a year into her work, and she's dreading the future. She is naive, a stupid girl with stupid dreams in a town that destroys people like her. She can already feel parts of her soul wearing thin, chips in the fine porcelain shell. 

The platinum-blonde on the stage before her finishes with a high cresendo that reverberates throughout the entire building and Sansa claps her hands enthusiastically as Daenerys Targaryen smiles sweetly, violet eyes hazy with post-perfomance bliss.

She is beautiful, with her long thick curls all the way to her shoulders decorated with tiny silver bells, and her long flowing black dresses that emphasise the intricate tattoos on her bony arms. She is infamous, if not for her voice then for the tribal leader she married, who is both fearsome and fearless and cares not one whit for Hollywood and all it's rules and regulations. A dark shadow strides to the stage, and Daenery's husband gathers her into his arms. For such a huge man he is delicate with her though, and her hip bumps his as she smiles up at him, the bulbs in the paparazzi's cameras flashing, and Sansa knows they'll be front page news tomorrow.

Sansa craves a love like that, a meeting of souls, so pure, so - so  _lovely._ She recalls her Mother and Father's love, the quiet smiles and whispered sweet nothings when they thought their children could not hear, and Sansa sighs melancholy and stands up to leave, pulling a hat over her curls.

"You're Alayne Stone." 

Sansa looks up at the appreciative voice.  A short woman with vouptous glossy curls inky black in colour, clad in a metallic evening gown that trails along the floor as she makes her way to Sansa's side. 

"Arianne Martell." She holds out a slim olive hand adorned with rings and Sansa shakes it tentatively. "I'm one of the owners of this establishment, and I'm always on the lookout for a new act to showcase and loan out. I saw you perform in the Mockingbird a few weeks ago and ever since I haven't been able to get you out of my mind. I've called a few times but you didn't reply. Looks like you decided to check us out for yourself." She grins. 

Sansa stares at her bewildered, for she is sure if this woman ever called her she wouldn't forget. "You called me?" 

"Well your manager. Truth be told he sounds like a wet sock." She leans in close, and she smells of oranges and champagne, her rouge lips inches away from Sansa's ear. "Alayne I think you're a doll. I can offer you more money then your current contract, and I won't restrict you to this club. Why not aspire to higher ambitions?" Arianne sighs, eyes wide with optimism. "What do you say?" 

"I can't." Sansa says, and even as she says the words her stomach plunges below her knees in disappointment. "Your offer sounds great, truly, but I'm contracted for five years." 

She expects Arianne to smile sympathetically and pat her on the back before prancing off to the next up and coming singer, but instead Arianne merely shrugs and procures a slim card seemingly from mid-air. Her fingers brush Sansa's as she passes it to her, cool and calm. 

"You want the best in the buisness. He's a champion at getting celebrities out of tricky contracts. Give him a call, won't cha?" 

She walks off with a wink and a promise to keep in touch as the offer still stands, and Sansa stares down at the neat lettered name on the card with a tight chest, her world tilting on its axis, a shivering hope deep in her bones that things will soon change.

* * *

She cradles a mug of pitch black coffee watching the steam roll hazily into the air, Bing Crosby's bass voice filtering through the radio. The diner is mostly deserted, but even still the waitresses watch her from the corner of their eyes and giggle, and one comes up to ask for an autograph Sansa wearily scrawls onto a napkin. It is late, five to the hour, and Oberyn Martell is supposed to meet her at ten. Sansa is always an early arriver, and she sits perched on a stool at the end of the diner with the flesh of her thighs sticking to the worn brown leather worrying about her entire situation. If she fails to arrive at work tomorrow or the day after Petyr could very well fire her on the spot, but somehow Sansa doubts he will let her go that easily. She prays to any God or deity listening that she can escape his seedy world, the underbelly of the fine Hollywood glamour. She just wants to  _sing,_ and the memory of his hard lips on hers makes her flinch, tongue running over her teeth nervously. What will he do, when he discovers her betrayal? When he gets the letter informing him she is challenging his contract? She closes her eyes chilled to the bone. He says he is a patient man, and perhaps he will do nothing, only to build the anticipation and paranoia within her to such heights she is crazed. Or perhaps he will kiss her again with more force and take what is his before she isn't. Nausea rises in her throat and she swallows the bitterness quickly, twisting a ring around her finger.

“I’d recognise that hair anywhere.”

Sansa stiffens, a hand automatically going to her scalp and smoothing the auburn tendrils as she looks over her shoulder. A tall man, a handsome man, effortlessly debonair in his dark suit, hands stuffed in his pockets and a fedora hat balanced effortlessly on his head. He smiles in welcome when their eyes meet, his lined face alight with genuine goodwill. 

“Has anyone ever told you you’re an older Shirley Temple?”

“Many times.” Sansa murmurs, fingers enfolding to clasp around the handle of her worn mug. “Are you Oberyn Martell?”

"Yes." He nods towards the empty seat beside her. “May I?”

She nods and he slides in placing his hat on the tabletop, and Sansa knows he must mean business. He has dark hair just like his niece, and a unshaven face with a shadow of stubble, a mustache atop his upper lip. He watches her watching him and smiles, dark eyes shining. 

"You're the man that helped Daenerys Targaryen win her case against the Spider." She realises slowly, taking a sip of coffee. It burns her tongue but she refuses to let her eyes water, and instead shifts in her seat, turning closer towards him. 

"I am." He nods, raising a finger to summon the waitress who languidly strolls over with the fresh pot. She slops it into another chipped off-white mug and Oberyn raises it in thanks before taking a sip. He sighs lovingly, and he has such long eyelashes they brush his chiseled cheeks when his eyes close, and Sansa watches him for a long moment unashamed.

"And you're Alayne Stone. Little Bird." His words are so sharp, so matter-of-fact and Sansa detests those names as much as she loves her singing.

"Sansa. Sansa Stark." She gently holds out a hand and Oberyn lowers his lips to brush gently against one slim white glove. 

"Sansa." His voice so soft now, and his eyes flicker to meet hers, eyebrows flecked with silver lowering. "I hear you need my help."

"I need to get out of a contract." She explains the whole situation, minus the part where Petyr's kisses taste like tar. Oberyn lights a cigar when she starts, and by the time she's finished, breathless and a strand of hair falling into her eyes, Oberyn is propping his head up by one elbow laid on the counter, nodding along with her while he puffs silently. Plumes of smoke unfurl around them and Sansa's eyes water but she doesn't look away from his heated gaze, the way his fingers stroke his jaw contemplatively. 

"Please." She is not above begging.

"I never turn down a client." Oberyn drawls, and the end of his cigar burns magma red, ash sprinkling down onto the scrumpled paper napkins lined with grease. 

Sansa sighs in relief, entire body sagging. "Thank you." 

"Anything I can do to help. There are so many young girls being exploited these days." His face darkens, pinching with distaste like he's eaten something sour and respect begins to bubble deep within Sansa's chest. 

"You're a good man, Mr Martell." Sansa says quietly. 

"I try my best." He agrees. "Did you bring your contract?"

"I left it at home." She confesses. "I... I wanted to-"

"A wise woman." He says quickly, easing her discomfort before she can make a further fool of herself. "I shall call upon you tomorrow then, if it suits you, and we can go over the details." 

"That sounds swell. Thank you." She tentatively lowers her hand upon his resting on the counter, squeezing his long fingers tight. His skin is soft, warm, and he doesn't move a muscle, body still loose and languid as a cat, and his lips flicker into a smile as her fingers slowly slide off and creep back to entangle with her other hand. 

They sit in a companionable silence for a few minutes, the late night taxis honking outside the diner, inside the waitress's gum snapping as she leans on one hip to turn the radio up when Billie Holliday begins to croon. They are dappled in shadows and night, and Sansa can see a sliver of a silver moon in the sky illuminating the silhouette of Oberyn, the slope of his nose, the curve of his mouth as he sucks at the cigar dangling from two fingers. She finishes the now lukewarm coffee, pushes the mug away from her and stands up. 

"I shall see you tomorrow then."

"I look forward to it."

* * *

His eyes pour over the document, the pristine pages Sansa had kept to the best condition she could manage. The tiny words printed at the bottom Petyr had distracted her from reading, flipping through with talk of stardom and riches far beyond her dreams, records with her name and picture plastered on the front. Sansa sits across the table watching him anxiously, and Oberyn's eyes glimmer from behind his half-moon glasses, brow crinkling.

"Can you help me?" She asks in a hushed tone, lips parting hopefully. 

He finishes reading with a smile, chuckling to himself as he tucks his glasses back into his front pocket, leaning back in his chair perfectly at home in Sansa's small and shabby rented apartment. He's dressed in a dark suit again, pinstriped and handsome, leather shoes shining as he rests his right leg on the thigh of his left. He looks oddly out of place amongst the lilac striped wallpaper and the lace sheers that hang loose and billowy around her half propped open windows. Definitely a masculine presence amongst all the flowers though he pays no heed to her home. He is here to do a job after all, and he pushes the contract back across the mahogony table to her. 

"This contract has a rather good loophole if you look past the big words."

"It does?" Sansa's breath catches, and she half-rises up off her chair in hope, eyes pinned on his. "Truly?" 

"It uses the wrong name." He smiles triumphantly, arms crossed and eyebrow arched in satisfaction, and Sansa's world crashes down.

She shakes her head defiantly refusing to believe him, pearl earrings trembling in her lobes. "No. No it doesn't, I signed my name in the contract right here, look.  _I, Sansa Stark-_ " She jabs her finger violently down on the dotted line. 

Oberyn's hands reach out to still hers, and they are large and solid and strong beneath hers, and his eyes bore into hers intently as he turns the contract around and taps once, twice at her scrawled name with one precise finger.  

"Yes, you said that you, Sansa Stark, were to be contracted to Mockingbird for five years, under the stage name of Alayne Stone. The solution is rather simple, is it not?" 

Sansa can only stare, one hand fiddling with the top button of her shirt in nerves, and Lord she needs a stiff drink.

"You perform under the name Sansa Stark. There is no word here that forbids Sansa Stark from performing in a rival club as Sansa Stark, only that a Miss Alayne Stone cannot." 

"It cannot be that easy." Sansa whispers. "It cannot." 

_It cannot._

Oberyn nods at all her spluttered refusals, that it simply cannot be that simple, that Petyr has a way with words, that surely something will crop up to halt her and leave her trapped. He takes note of all her panic and points and calmly defuses them all, pointing out rational, logical ways to deal with him.

"You forget I have done this plenty of times." Oberyn soothes, hand patting hers, warm thumb rubbing her knuckles comfortingly. "You have nothing to worry about." 

"He kissed me."

The words fall from her lips and Sansa is sure she is more surprised then Oberyn, whose handsome face regards her candidly. 

"I suspected as much." Is all her lawyer says. "All the more reason to win hmm?"

* * *

The process takes place over three hours. Sansa has Oberyn to defend her of course, as she slinks into Petyr's office with her eyes defiant, hands knuckled into fists in her skirts. Petyr argues, and argues, and argues. Sansa whispers to Oberyn before they go in that he is good with words, twists every sound that comes out of one's mouth to meet his own agenda; Oberyn merely smiles with a challenge in his arms and a self-assured air around the set of his lips, quirked up as they stare at Sansa's manager. 

Petyr flicks on the lamp stood to one side of his desk, the tassels swinging wildly as light blooms in the small office, and Sansa sits silent beside Oberyn who could not look less bothered if he tried. Like a snake eyeing its prey deciding on the best course of action.

"That may be," Petyr finally concedes when Oberyn has laid out exactly why Sansa's contract is null, and his eyes turn to Sansa and she remembers the taste of his kisses and freezes. "But you still owe me four more years of music under Alayne Stone." 

Sansa blanches, head whipping around to stare at Oberyn in mute appeal. A smile plays around her lawyers mouth as he shakes his head. 

"Alayne Stone was a person crafted from nothing but your own fantasies projected onto an innocent girl. Alayne Stone exists only in your own head, just like your thoughts of your own grandeur, and if one does not exist, one does not owe someone four years of music. And I truly doubt that will be a problem when you're in jail for extortion." Oberyn's voice is so smooth, so level and matter-of-fact it takes a few moments for his words to sink in, and then Petyr's chair is screeching on the floor as he half-rises from his seat and towers over his desk.

"Excuse me?" Voice breathy and laced with ice, eyes narrowed. 

"I don't believe you're deaf Mr Baelish. _Littlefinger._ If you don't want to be hit with a lawsuit and spend several years in jail I suggest you let Miss Stark here go and we can all forget this ever happened."

"I won't forget." Petyr promises, even as he scrumples up Sansa's contract.

"The copy?" Oberyn says unfazed, hand outstretched and Petyr's lip twitches with annoyance as he opens his drawer and hands over the other. 

"You could have had it all." Petyr says as Sansa heads to the door. Sansa turns to meet him defiantly, eyes glowering at the man who had made her life rotten.

"I never wanted you." She is pure steel, her clipped voice ringing around the room afterwards to silence, and it is only Oberyn's warm hand on the small of her back that makes her legs begin to move again. 

"Don't worry," Oberyn whispers in her ear as they close the door of the building behind them. "I'm going to turn him in anyway."  

* * *

Sansa adjusts the heavy white fur tippet around her neck, the soft ermine fur tickling her chin as she settles down on the chair in front of her dressing table. Winter blue roses are in a vase beside her, their sweet fragrance spilling into the air and the thunderous claps and cheers still ring in her ears from ten minutes earlier, and Oberyn was smiling so wide in the front row she couldn't resist smiling back, and she smiles giddily now as she takes off her eye makeup, gulps down warm water flavoured with lemon and honey to soothe her aching throat. She had sung the best she had ever, she would wager. Sung until her chest was aching and tears pooled in her eyes as she gripped the microphone. 

There's a rap of knuckles on the door and she turns to invite Oberyn in, who saunters up to her with a grin, pearly whites flashing in his swarthy face, his necktie the same shade as the flowers he bought her.

"Do you like the roses?"

"They're my favourite." Sansa says with delight, stroking the velvet petals of the bouquet. "How did you know?"

"I have my ways." He grins as Sansa tidies up, screwing tight bottles of cream and placing them in her bag, taking off the hair piece so her loose curls tumble down her back.  

"So I was thinking, I never did say thank you. Maybe we could go back to that diner…” Sansa proposes as she buttons up her coat, nails shining with glitter polish as she tugs on her fur-lined gloves. “Have a drink. A _real_ drink.”

"That sounds perfect." Oberyn sticks out his arm, and Sansa twines her arm around his and holds him close, lolling her head in the crook of his elbow.

She locks her dressing room with her name plaque over the top and they meander backstage, past dancers and stagehands who congraulate Sansa. She gracefully swoops in to sign autographs for the small girls holding out pens with quivering hands and her red painted lips tilt into a warm smile. 

"You were so good." One says feverently, tongue poking through the gap in her teeth as she bobs on her toes and Sansa thanks them all graciously, tightening her scarf as Oberyn pulls open the door and they wander out into the street.

Sansa's heels ring out on the pavement as they walk, slow and steady down the avenue. The sky is so clear, and Sansa gazes up at the stars twinkling trying to pick out constellations. They walk in comfortable silence, Oberyn warm beside her, breath tickling a lock of hair behind her ear. 

The starlight reflects in his eyes and he smells of cologne and hooch, and when she drags him to a stop below a streetlight, small hands clutching his collar, his mouth tastes like freedom. 


End file.
